The North Carolina House of Representatives released highlights of its balanced budget proposal for the 2017-2018 biennium on Thursday, submitting a plan that continues to advance successful government investment strategies contributing to revenue surpluses, rainy day reserves, rapid economic and population growth this decade.

The budget highlights released on Thursday were provided to area appropriations subcommittees for consideration and votes before the House’s full spending plan – including state employee salaries and benefits, further commitments to the savings reserves, disaster recovery allocations, tax cuts and other provisions – is released next week.

Since first assuming the majority in 2011, House Republicans have invested wisely and rewarded taxpayers with lower sales tax rates, lower income tax rates, and lower taxes on businesses. The results have been impressive:

$447 million surplus in FY 2015

$430 million surplus in FY 2016

$581 million surplus in FY 2017

$1.2 billion rainy day reserve

$2.5 billion debt repaid

Last decade, the Democrat-led General Assembly raised sales taxes in 2003, 2005, 2007, and 2009 — yet they still managed to dig a fiscal hole, including $2.5 billion in debt — and hundreds of millions of dollars in budget deficits for programs like Medicaid — for Republicans to fix in 2011.

“Taxpayers funds belong to the citizens who worked for them,” said Senior Appropriations Committee Chairman Nelson Dollar. “And they expect us to be good stewards of their hard-earned tax dollars just as they are with money for their families and businesses. Our goal is to set the right priorities and ensure our citizens’ tax dollars are spent wisely in ways that will improve our schools, grow our economy and improve the quality of life for all North Carolinians.”

Last Decade: Sales tax increase in 2003, 2005, 2007 and 2009 — billions in higher taxes on North Carolinians.

“There will always be pressure to spend more in state government,” said Appropriations Chairman Dean Arp. “This includes the historic desire to shackle the taxpayers with more long-term debt that will lead to higher taxes in years ahead.”

“A key difference is the House prefers smart investments that produce results instead of wasteful spending that produce higher taxes, deficits and debt,” continued Representative Arp. “We are creating jobs while living within our means, ensuring a fiscally sound state that enables our taxpayers to keep more of their hard-earned dollars.”

Provides funds for the Eastern NC STEM program, which is a summer residential STEM program for underserved students.

K-12 Special Provisions

Future Ready Students: Establishes business advisory councils that will assist school districts in providing CTE instruction, identify, economic and workforce development trends in the region, and advocate for strong local CTE programs.

Expand CTE Competitive Grant Program

North Carolina Community College System Highlights

Career Coaches: Provides funding to support the expansion of the NC Works Career Coaches program, which places career coaches employed by local community colleges with partnering high schools.

Apprenticeship NC: Provides for the transfer of the Apprenticeship program from the Department of Commerce to the NC Community College System. The program coordinates with employers to train and employ apprentices in order to mitigate skills gaps and meet critical workforce and labor market needs.

North Carolina Community College System Special Provisions

Establishes the High-Achieving Tuition Scholarship Program. Recent North Carolina resident high school graduates with an unweighted GPA of at least 3.5 meeting other eligibility criteria may receive scholarships covering the full cost of tuition at a community college for up to four semesters.

University of North Carolina System Special Provisions

Establishes the Teaching Fellows program, a competitive forgivable loan program that will provide students interested in entering teaching in STEM or special education fields with up to $8,250 per year. The loans may be used for tuition, fees, and the cost of books. Loans made to Teaching Fellows may be forgiven if the recipient, for each year of loans received, serves either one year in a North Carolina public school identified as low-performing or two years in a North Carolina public school that is not identified as low-performing.

Allows senior citizens to audit courses at the University of North Carolina or North Carolina Community Colleges for free, provided that they have permission from the instructor and there is space available in the course.

Highlights of House General Government Budget

Continuing to make the Workforce Housing Loan Program a priority by providing funding for each year for the development of low-income housing units around the State (through combination of receipts and appropriations),

Department of Military and Veterans Affairs

Provides additional funding to assist communities in investment efforts to sustain and maintain NC’s military programs and activities.

Scholarships for Children of War Veterans: Provides funding to increase the scholarship allowance for children of veterans.

Office of the State Controller

Provides funding to the Community Living Housing Fund to help increase access to community-based housing for individuals with disabilities.

Highlights of House Health and Human Services Budget

Provides funding for continued development of NC FAST including the Child Welfare case management system.

Supports the ongoing operation, development and enhancement of the Controlled Substances Reporting System to automate reports, generate and deploy advanced analytics to improve prescribing practices and to identify unusual prescribing patterns.

Special Provisions

Provides funding to increase the number of Pre-K slots. NC Pre-K slots will be increased by 2,300 in FY 2017-18 and 4,700 in FY 2018-19 over the number of FY 2016-17 slots. The total number of slots will be approximately 29,300 in FY 2017-18 and 31,700 in FY 2018-19. This will eliminate the current waiting list by FY 2018-19. (Current number of NC Pre-K slots is 27,000)

Single Stream Funding defines the reduction amount for each LME/MCO for both recurring and nonrecurring reductions. The provision directs the Secretary to provide any recommended changes in these amounts to the JLOC for Health and Human Services by March 1, 2018 and directs the Department to begin a quarterly financial review of all LME/MCOs to identify vulnerable LME/MCOs.

Purchase of psychiatric and facility based crisis beds with Dorothea Dix Property to increase inpatient behavioral health bed capacity for adults at 5 selected hospitals, Also funds a case management pilot program in Wake County.

Highlights of House Natural and Economic Resources Budget

Provides funding for firefighting equipment for the Forest Service

Provides funding for the Tobacco Trust Fund

Provides funding for the Agricultural Development and Farmland Preservation Trust Fund.

Provides funding for international marketing and food marketing

Provides funding to keep the Linville River Nursery open

Highlights of House Commerce Budget

Provides funding for a new Site and Building Development Fund

Provides funding for tourism and business advertising

Provides funding to Main Street Solutions and for rural grants.

Provides funding for the One NC Small Business Fund, which provides technology grants.

Provides funding to the Carolina Small Business Fund

Highlights of House Information Technology Budget

Funds the ongoing operations and maintenance of the Department’s project management system and funds the creation of a data management plan for the Government Data Analytics Center (GDAC)

Provides funding to replace an expiring federal grant that supported the expansion of a wireless broadband system for public safety personnel and the Broadband Infrastructure Office

Increases the funding for GDAC by to pay for system infrastructure and operational improvements, as well as a risk and vulnerability study of state agencies